Breathe
by miakaweasley
Summary: **updated** Chapter Three is up! Jack has deep thoughts, and Irina remembers a painful night from her past. Please R/R!
1. Breathe

A/N- Hey all! This is my second Alias fic, I hope everyone enjoys it! It's J/I, which is always fun. Please leave me a nice long review!  
  
Breathe  
Chapter 1  
  
Irina sat bolt upright on the hard metal cot, rubbing her temples and trying to force the images from her mind. She had had the dream again.   
  
The same dream that had haunted her intermittently for the past twenty years. It was always the same and always painful. It was no use; the familiar images broke upon her like waves.   
  
In the dream she walked through the red front door of a colonial style house, she knew this house but it always took her a moment it to place it.  
  
When she entered the house she saw a man sitting on a couch to her left, she recognized him at once and smiled. He smiled warmly and got up and walked towards her. "Welcome home " he always said and then leaned in and kissed her sweetly. She held his hand and they walked up the hard wood stairs of the beautiful house. They paused at a door way and lying on the floor just inside was a little girl. The girl was around six years old; she had beautiful chestnut hair that hung in her face as she contently colored a picture of her family. She looked up and her little face brightened as she said, "hi mom." Then suddenly Irina wasn't in the house any more. She felt cold water rushing over her and a swirl of images bombarded her. Blood, bullets, thousands of faked smiles, hundreds of strange places, faces filled with deception and hate startled her awake.  
  
Suddenly back in her cell, the images that had awoken her slowly fading away. She got to her feet and tried to stretch the pain out of her stiff joints. She hated this dream it always left her feeling both lonely and vulnerable, two feelings she despised.   
  
Pacing the now oppressively familiar room, she attempted to sort through her thoughts, to numb herself to the torrent of emotions raging beneath her usually cool exterior.   
  
She knew this was useless. From experience she knew there were only two ways to force these unwelcome thoughts from her brain. She either needed a high dose of adrenaline or she would have to analysis why the dream made her feel the way it did. She settled on the second since the sixteen foot square she was living in provided very few opportunities for an adrenaline rush. Reluctantly she stopped pacing and sat cross-legged on the floor allowing her mind to wander freely.  
  
First her mind went to the house she recognized has the house where she and Jack had lived for most of their ten years of marriage. She had always loved that house. It was the only place she had ever felt safe.   
  
Her mind wandered to Jack welcoming her home. He had the most sincere expression on his face, his eyes bright and full of life, completely different from the cold glint they now had most of the time. This thought initiated a dull ache in the pit of her stomach which she recognized as guilt. Years of practice quickly squelched the ache and she returned to her reverie.   
  
Her next thought was of the sweet perfect kiss. It was so pure, so unadulterated, and most of all it felt real. God, she missed kissing him. She held that thought for a moment before settling on the little girl on the floor.   
  
It was Sydney, the way Irina remembered her; safe, happy, completely devoid of the emotional baggage she was now forced to carry. The dull ache was back and this time it would not bet soothed.   
  
She reluctantly began to focus on the barrage of painful images that had awoken her.   
  
Suddenly the sound of foot steps snapped Iriana back to reality. She mentally scrambled to gain composure, to look calm and collected. All she could think was please let this be the guard, Vaughn, even Kendall anyone but Jack.   
  
The footsteps grew closer and finally stopped. Hesitantly she looked up attempting to keep her face completely expressionless and she found herself staring straight into his blank cold brown eyes.  
  
A/N- Heehee, more to come. Please read and review- the more reviews I get, the faster the chapters will come--action is coming, I promise! 


	2. Playing the Fool

AN: this is the second chapter to "Breathe." I hope you guys like it.   
The chapter titles for these chapters are based on the lyrics to the   
Greenwheel song "Breathe" if you can I recommend downloading it. It's lyrics   
really fit the Jack and Irina dynamic. Please Read and Review(if you can't get the   
song let me know and I'll post the lyrics) The characters aren't mine, I wish I   
could claim them.   
  
Chapter 2   
Playing the fool  
  
Irina knew her eyes had betrayed her. Her emotional vulnerability   
would have been completely unperceivable to anyone else, but she saw Jack   
register it almost immediately. He just stood their studying her trying to   
ascertain exactly what he had just seen in her eyes. She wanted to squirm, wanted   
to hide from his penetrating gaze, but resolve, curiosities and years of   
practice kept her rooted to the spot. She wished he would just say   
something.   
  
Jack had no idea with what he had just seen. He thought he was   
prepared for anything but the strange look of remorse and openness in   
her eyes caught him completely off guard. He mentally filed it away to   
analyze later.  
  
He was still just standing there, she decided she had to say   
something or go crazy. She was pretty sure she had regained at least   
some semblance of control and decided on something simple.  
"Jack" she said allowing her accent to ooze through in order to disguise any accidental   
display of emotion.   
  
This word had the desired effect; Jack suddenly   
became aware of the manila envelope in his hand.   
  
"I don't know if anyone's told you" he began in his best all business tone, "but the Alliance   
has been successfully destroyed"  
  
This news brought strange unreadable expression to Irina's face. Jack   
noted it and then continued.  
  
"However when we raided the SD-6, both Sloane and Sark were MIA, we   
where also unable to locate any of the Rambaldi devices the Alliance has   
recovered throughout the past decades." Jack paused. "I seem to be the only one   
who thinks this is odd. If you could provide us with any information as to   
where Sark may have gone, I would greatly appreciate it."  
  
He hadn't really meant to say "I" at the end of the last statement and   
Irina knew it.   
  
She didn't want to admit it but the news of the Alliance's   
downfall had brought her a momentary rush of panic. She feared that   
her information would no longer be viewed as relevant to the CIA and she   
would be taken away from the people who mattered most to her. This feeling   
was coupled with feeling of pride and happiness for Sydney and relief for   
Jack.   
  
She pushed these feelings aside, she was compartmentalizing so much   
right now she didn't now how much longer she could keep this façade up. She   
forced herself to focus on the question at hand.  
  
"If Sark's in hiding he is most likely somewhere in the tropics. He   
formerly had safe houses in both Bermuda and Fiji. I know because   
footed the bill for both." She shook her head sardonically.  
  
"As for the Rambaldi devices, that's a bit more complicated. Awhile ago Sark  
stumbled upon intel that lead him to believe that Rambaldi's ultimate aim was immortality   
and that elements of each of the devices combined to form a machine that   
could manipulate the human genome. Naturally, I was interested, but Sark was   
obsessed," She paused waiting as Jack processed all she had told him.   
  
She could see his mind working over time.   
  
"So, Sloane and Sark are obviously trying to collect the remaining   
Rambaldi devices, where would they go next?" Jack asked more to himself than to   
her.  
  
"Well in order to assemble the various components, they need a   
manuscript that Sark was working to obtain before I "disappeared" and they also   
need the untarnished copies of all the Rambaldi artifacts, the CIA has   
intercepted over the years."  
  
At this Jack looked up sharply and met her eyes. "Do you suppose Sark   
and Sloane would be that bold?"  
Irina smirked "Would that honestly surprise you?"  
  
"So there are two ways to prevent them from fulfilling there goals,   
either prevent them form ever obtaining the devices we have acquired or obtain   
their copy of the manuscript." Jack thought out loud.  
  
"Precisely." Irina agreed a little more emphatically than she meant to.  
  
Jack met her eyes again and paused. The realization that he was loving   
this and that perhaps she was too, hit him and left him unsure how to end   
the conversation. He decided on a curt nod and briskly turned and walked   
down the hall; leaving Irina alone with her thoughts and an acute awareness   
of how alone she felt.  
  
AN: I know this chapter was a little slow, but it was necessary to   
establish the plot. I hope you liked it and I promise all sorts of action to   
come. Sorry this was slow in coming I got a bit bogged down with school. Read   
and review, the more you do the faster I post. 


	3. Home is a Feeling I Buried In You

AN: Sorry this took a while to post. Studying has taken over my life.   
Well I hope you guys like it. Please read and review. More excitement to   
come, I promise.  
  
Chapter 3  
Home is a Feeling I Buried in You  
  
Jack walked down the long hallway, focusing intently on maintaining the stoic expression on   
his face. He hated the feelings that always forced themselves into his mind after he talked to   
Irina. There was a toxic combination of anger, bitterness, nostalgia, intrigue and a variety of   
feelings he was not willing to let himself acknowledge. He tried to force his mind to focus on   
the situation at hand, tried to formulate some form of plan. It was useless, his mind kept returning  
to the strange expression on her face when he had first entered the room.   
  
Jack simply could not understand what he had seen, but he was sure that she had not meant   
for him to notice. Her dark brown eyes had portrayed a vulnerable look of remorse   
and loneliness, something he simply was not prepared to see. It was as though each  
conversation with her was clawing away at the carefully constructed walls around his heart.   
The walls that protected him from the pain and prevented him from viewing this woman as  
anything but purely evil.   
  
Jack looked up almost startled to find himself in the command station of the Ops Center.   
He had been so deep in thoughts that he hadn't paid any attention to where he was going.   
He scanned the room for Kendall, eager to share his newly acquired intel and prevent himself  
from returning to his introspection. His eyes fell instead on Sydney; she was leaning on a   
table deeply immersed in a conversation with Vaughn. As he watched her he realized that for  
the first time in two years she looked genuinely happy.   
  
"Jack,"a voice to his left said.   
  
It was Kendall he was looking at Jack with the same intense look he always had, secretly Jack wondered if hi   
facial muscles ever relaxed.   
  
"Yes," answered Jack remembering why he was there in the first places "I have   
aquired what I believe to be valuable intel regarding Sark and Slaone's   
future intentions."  
~*~  
  
The icy cold water rushed all around her, Irina felt frozen and lost.   
Suddenly a pair of powerful hands closed around her arms pulling her to the   
surface. She looked up into the face of the hand's owner and suddenly   
longed for the cold confusion of the water. Cold stony faces stared   
disapprovingly at her as she shivered and fought the tears that welled   
up in the back of her throat.  
  
"Irina, or do you prefer Laura now." A cruel mocking voice she   
recognized as Cuvee taunted her "time to go home."  
  
He continued as she was pulled to her feet and her wrists were securely chained. She hated  
his smile, she hated the way "home" sounded coming from his mouth. As she lay in the back   
of the van driving her further and further away from the only place she wanted to   
be, she fought the urge to just give up. Images of Jack and her beautiful   
daughter flashed before and she chastised herself for being so stupid. How   
had she even dreamt that it would last?   
  
Laying there shivering in the dark, watching the carefully constructed happy façade slip away  
from her, she made a silent vow. She swore to herself that these men who had   
torn her from the only two people she had ever loved would never see her cry;   
she would do whatever it took to survive and never let them defeat her.  
  
Irina snapped awake she could still feel all the anguish of that night   
as though it had just happened. She had buried it under so many defenses   
and lies the acuteness of it startled her. Sleep was always a gamble for   
her; it was the only time she lost control of her carefully ordered   
thoughts. It had always been more of a dangerous necessity than a luxury for her.  
  
She swung her legs over the edge of her hard steel bed and tried to   
gather her thoughts. To force this dream and all the feelings it brought back   
into the far reaches of her mind where it belonged. She shook her head   
allowing her hair to fall around her like a barrier protecting her from the   
world. She heard a quiet cough and suddenly became acutely aware of a pair of   
eyes taking in her actions. She forced herself to be calm and slowly looked   
to see who her observer was. Jack was standing a bit awkwardly on the   
other side of the glass. She wondered how long he had been waiting for her to   
wake up.  
  
"I thought you would like to know that The CIA has tightened security   
on the Rambaldi artifacts currently in there possession and Sydney is leading   
a team to the last known location of the manuscript in hopes of   
retrieving it." Jack said expressionlessly, still eyeing her curiously.   
  
She cleared her throat and nodded sauntering over to the chair on her   
side of the glass and taking a seat. To her surprise Jack took the seat opposite   
her and stared at her waiting for her to speak.   
  
A/N- R/R! 


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